


Pipe Dream

by Madlyie



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Comfort, Enjoltaire Week 2016, Feels, Grantaire is my child and I am sad, M/M, exr week 2016
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-05
Updated: 2016-06-05
Packaged: 2018-07-12 11:35:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7101568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Madlyie/pseuds/Madlyie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>“What do you see? When you stand here, look down there.” The expression on his face was unexpectedly sincere, no trace of scorn or sharpness in the question or his voice.</em>
  <br/>
  <br/>
  <em>Grantaire looked out of the window, back to Enjolras.</em>
  <br/>
  <br/>
  <em>“Nothing,” he said.</em>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pipe Dream

**Author's Note:**

> Me? Emotional about dead fictional french people? Bet on it. This is for Day 1 of Enjoltaire week on tumblr with the topic 'Embrace' as well as for my sad, sad, emotional heart. Enjoy...? ♥

 

 **_Then between shadow and substance, night and light,_ **  
**_Then between birth and death, and deeds and days,_ **  
**_The illimitable embrace [...]_ **

_Algernon Charles Swinburne - Genesis_

 

 

***

 

Marius was someone whose eyes were always open when he dreamed.

In that way, Grantaire thought, there wasn’t that much of a difference between them.

Maybe they weren’t even dreaming of things all too different as well, brightness and beauty.

He wondered if Marius felt the same pain of getting burned with every hope and dream too but he doubted it. Not with the way the young man laughed too blithely at one of Courfeyrac’s jokes or the way his eyes were always bright when he got lost staring into the distance again.

 

“It’s too early for sad thoughts,” Joly said softly.

He was sprawled half across Bossuet and his glasses were slipping from his nose but he didn’t make any move to push them back up. There was a slight red tinge to his cheeks but his words were still clear and distinguishable which was a lot more than could be said for most of the other people in the room.

 

It was in the middle of the night, past midnight, but for Joly every time was too early for sadness.

 

Grantaire decided to indulge him and smiled. “If you say so.”

The frown on the other man’s forehead eased away a little. Bossuet hummed quietly.

 

They all sat together at Jehan’s place, a single wide room directly under the roof, with stacks of books littering the wooden floor and the smell of herbs and smoke in the warm air of late spring nights.

Jehan was playing a melody on the flute that Grantaire didn’t recognise, something sweet and a little bit wistful, smooth tones, legato.

Marius sat nearby on the floor, maybe listening, maybe not. It was difficult to tell because the look in his eyes was somewhere else.

Combeferre and Courfeyrac silently shared a bottle of wine between them, their ankles crossed in a familiar, naturally comfortable way that neither of them seemed to quite notice.

Even Bahorel had passed the stage of drunken brawling and loud laughter and listened with his eyes half-closed, heavy-lidded.

Feuilly and Enjolras were talking quietly about something Grantaire couldn’t understand.

 

It was wholesome, the entire moment, too quiet and too peaceful, and sobering.

 

Grantaire stood up.

  
  
Joly blinked at him, a question in his eyes but Grantaire shook his head and put up a smile that was as small as it was unconvincing but Joly didn’t call him out on it. Bossuet simply lifted his arm and held up a half empty bottle of eyes. He didn’t open his eyes and maybe then Grantaire’s smile wasn’t all that strained after all.

 

At the other end of the room, a window overlooked the streets below. The fresh air calmed the haunting whispers again that got louder in his sobering state of mind. He didn’t know how long he stood there, thinking nothing, listening to Jehan play.

He heard the footsteps that were coming closer so he didn’t startle when Enjolras stepped up next to him, the angles of his face sharpened by shadows.

Grantaire knew better than to offer him the bottle of wine so he simply raised it to his own lips before setting it back down on the windowsill with a soft clunk.

 

“Do you sometimes think,” Enjolras started, “How strange the quiet is?”

  
Grantaire risked another glance at him. “People are sleeping. It’s quiet. Nothing strange about that.”

A small smile spread over Enjolras’s face. “It doesn’t feel like it though, does it?”

And because Grantaire wasn’t strong enough to look away but at the same time couldn’t stand the sight of that smile, too warm, too soft and intimate, his mouth jumped to his usual method of self-preservation.

 

Grantaire huffed. “Are you telling me you’re hearing strange voices in your head, Apollo?”

 

In a usual conversation this would have been the moment for Enjolras to roll his eyes, snap at him to quit joking about something like that followed by some other equally biting, sharp comment.

  
Enjolras kept smiling seemingly unfazed by the boldly placed sarcasm in Grantaire’s voice and ignored the question. “There are so many people in the city and then we get moments like this when everyone else is asleep and there could as well be none at all.”

“Don’t mistake sleeping for death. Some people are more when they sleep than when they’re awake. Dreaming can be more lucid than life. For some it’s all there is.”

Enjolras response was a single low humming sound, as close to agreeing as it could get. Other days, nights, Grantaire would have made fun of him for that but the city under them was quiet so he was too.

He expected Enjolras to turn around then, leave, walk back to the others still sitting scattered in the room behind them but he stayed. He did turn, a little, angling his body more towards Grantaire, leaning against the windowsill.

“What do you see? When you stand here, look down there.” The expression on his face was unexpectedly sincere, no trace of scorn or sharpness in the question or his voice.

Grantaire looked out of the window, back to Enjolras.

  
“Nothing,” he said.

 

The other man frowned, long lashes brushing his cheeks when he blinked and opened his mouth to say something but Grantaire was faster. “It has nothing to do with the darkness. It’s night, yes. It’s dark and it will be still for a few hours but I’d say the same at daylight. It’s that you can be up here, looking down at all of this and you can see houses and streets but really, what does it matter. You can’t see the dirt from here that you know is there, or the beggars or the people that are crying. It’s beautiful when you look down from above but it’s nothing. It’s a pretty illusion of what can’t be real.”

 

Enjolras’s eyes were blue and bright and burning into Grantaire’s own. “It could be.”

 

And the problem was that when he said it, like that, unwavering and certain, Grantaire wanted to dream of it, this world, without the pain and ache of knowing it was hopeless.

  
“Nothing’s real,” he lied not knowing who it was he was trying to convince. It would be easier if it was the truth, if he wasn’t standing next to the proof that it was a lie.

He turned away from Enjolras with nothing more to say. Before he could reach for the bottle of wine - real enough, not too real - he felt a hand on his shoulder, a warm, soft pressure.

 

Enjolras’s arms came up to wrap around his shoulders and Grantaire stood still for a second of a lifetime until his arms divested themselves from the hold of his mind and encircled Enjolras’s waist in return, just lightly, careful as if they could shatter whatever they were holding.

Enjolras’s soft curls brushed the sight of his neck.  
  
Grantaire almost didn’t hear the words then, whispered and questioning.

“Is that so?”

 

And because he couldn’t find the strength to lie, so close that his heartbeat would have betrayed him, Grantaire didn’t say anything.

  
Sometimes he wished he could stop dreaming but he knew as certain as Enjolras was in his arms, that he wasn’t going to stop.

Not now.

Not ever.

Even when he wanted to.

Even when he was going to be asleep, six feet under the earth.

 

***

**Author's Note:**

> You're welcome to come and cry with me on [tumblr](http://vintage-jehan.tumblr.com/).


End file.
